Tuesday, April 6, 2010

My dear friend Victoria over at Let the Son Shine, is doing a new meme on the first Tuesday of each month. I simply love it. It gives us the opportunity to rummage through the archives of the blog to a time when no one, and I mean not a person but my husband and one or two friends, read it.

I need to see some of these lessons, again. I need to hear past-Tracy tell me to intentionally put on the fruits of the Spirit if I want to see them in my daily life. What a challenge! Isn't it amazing how we continually need the same words?

Colossians 3:12-15, “As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. 13 Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord﻿ has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. 14 Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. 15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful.”

Upon my initial reading of this verse, I thought to myself, “Isn’t it great that Paul loved clothing as much as I do”? I have been trying to picture this scenario for the average woman, as we walk into a department store, up the escalator and saunter into our favorite clothes area.

Immediately, things start to pop out at us and we travel to them, seemingly effortlessly. My mother’s favorite color for clothing is lime green, she moves faster in a department store than anyone that I have ever seen, so off to any lime green sweater vests she would go. I am trying to spiff up my church clothes, so I would be off to the button up shirts and slacks (I am horribly predictable).

What would the clothing of compassion look like in our department store? How about kindness, humility, meekness and patience…what about love? Would we be subject to the endless row of sweatpants with the fruits of the spirit embroidered on the rear end? Would it be emblazoned across the drop neck tees, perhaps with glitter? Maybe it would be hanging from a bright golden necklace…unmistakable to strangers that we do indeed possess these amazing fruits. Is this good enough, or is it window shopping the Spirit?

I found a litmus test for myself in these verses. Verse 13 tells me that “putting on” compassion, kindness, humility, meekness and patience can be seen through my bearing of others. The way that I deal with others tells me what I need to know, like dealing with the lady at the cash register, or the young girl that just laid down on the floor screaming for a new pair of humility sweatpants…or my husband.

What is happening in my heart and head can tell me if I am window shopping. Here is a big one; I can look at the way that I am willing to forgive the past and present mistakes of those around me, by loosing them on earth and laying them at the foot of the cross for Christ to work in their lives. This tells me if I am a spiritual window shopper.

And love…it leads to perfect harmony (Love = Perfect Harmony). How many of us have perfect harmony? Do we let the peace of Christ rule in our hearts? I say that again…let the peace of Christ rule in my heart.

I come across people, all of the time, window shopping for peace. I want peace. That cannot be window shopped; it is Christ living in our hearts and taking the hits that confuse us and leave us spiritually bankrupt at the end of the day. Why? Because we are His, holy and beloved. Holy and beloved.

Thank you Jesus for making us your beloved. Thank you for taking the hits for me today. Take us away from window shopping so that we can experience you. I pray that each of you will let the peace of God reign in your lives.

I also needed this today. What a fantastic idea! There are so many times I think back to times when my walk was stronger or when the Lord brought me through something that was rough and think, "How could I forget that?" This is an awesome reminder that God is always with us and that He can use our past experiences and lessons AGAIN in our lives.

This was an awesome post! Thank you for resurrecting this post. We can't just window shop our Christianity can we? It denotes that we can just take it lightly, return it if we decide it doesn't fit. I like how you put this post together. Thanks for writing this...then and now.

I love this post. So much. What a perfect analogy of shopping with those verses. As I was reading i was thinking of all the ways I have tried to window shop in the past. Oh dear. I try often. Especially for those things I really need. Like peace.